Corporations don't need any more tax breaks

Tim Hortons, headquartered in Ontario, Canada, was bought in August by Burger King for more than $11 billion.

Tim Hortons, headquartered in Ontario, Canada, was bought in August by Burger King for more than $11 billion. (Aaron Vincent Elkaim, Getty Images File Photo)

Opinion: How cutting corporate taxes will affect the poor

The truth about the Burger King tax inversion issue is that Tim Hortons is much larger than Burger King in terms of gross revenue. Perhaps the issue is more a case of Tim Hortons staying in Canada rather than it is about Burger King leaving the U.S. for tax purposes.

It is estimated that federal subsidies to corporations cost American taxpayers $100 billion per year. Of state and local taxes, $80 billion goes to corporations. Companies such as Shell, Ford and Chrysler receive $1 billion each in state and local subsidies.

Indirect tax benefits (such as health care) to the fast food industry amount to $243 billion from American taxpayers. To top all of this off, early 2013 saw bills passed with 43 new tax breaks worth $67 billion for American corporations. Some of these companies have billion-dollar profits yet pay little or no federal corporate taxes because of loopholes.

Republican Congressman Dent supports a plan (by his own admission) that will cut the taxes on these rich corporations, thus further increasing the tax burden onto the backs of the American middle class. Enough is enough.